Amplifying Veteran Voices Through Podcasting (Military Creator Con Panel 2026)

Recorded live at Military Creator Con 2026 in Arlington, Texas, this special episode features my portions of the Podcaster Panel, including the questions directed to me and my responses. The full panel was moderated by Military Creator Con Founder James Van Prooyen and also featured Mike Dell, Founder of Blubrry, and Robin Phoenix Johnson, comedian and podcaster. This release focuses specifically on my perspective and experiences, while the complete panel is available separately through Military Creator Con for future purchase.

I share how I discovered podcasting while still serving on active duty in the U.S. Navy, using long drives and commutes as opportunities to learn, stay entertained, and make better use of my time. That eventually led me to create Couple O’ Nukes without really knowing what I was doing—which means I also made plenty of mistakes. I discuss why aspiring podcasters should research the business, technology, branding, and resources available to them before launching, as well as why military service members do not have to postpone their creative ambitions until after leaving the uniform.

Mr. Van Prooyen also pushes the conversation into personal branding, leveraging a podcast, and determining what success actually means. I explain how Couple O’ Nukes grew beyond its original military roots into a platform supporting my work in speaking, comedy, writing, mental health advocacy, suicide prevention, and self-improvement. For me, podcasting has never simply been about download numbers. It is about building trust, authority, reputation, connection, and a body of work that can continue reaching the right person at the right time—even years after an episode was originally released.

I also get into some of the less glamorous realities of podcasting: difficult guests, rejecting episodes that do not align with your standards, unrealistic expectations about making money, online criticism, fluctuating engagement, and the enormous amount of work creators often perform behind the scenes. From recording video even when you initially plan to release audio only, to editing your own early episodes, experimenting with social media clips and B-roll, cross-promoting appearances, and learning your voice before outsourcing everything, this conversation is a practical look at podcasting as both a creative craft and a long-term platform. Whether you are a veteran, military creator, aspiring podcaster, content creator, or someone trying to turn your ideas into something meaningful, this episode offers lessons I learned by building the show from the ground up.

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Website: https://coupleonukes.com

Discounted Military Creator Con Tickets: http://militarycreatorcon.com/register?afmc=MCCMW

Exodus, Honor Your Heart, & Nulu Knives: https://www.coupleonukes.com/affiliates/

Want to be a guest on Couple O' Nukes? Send me a message on PodMatch:  https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/1726279485588093e83e0e007

Sign Up For A PodMatch Account: https://www.joinpodmatch.com/coupleonukes

*Couple O' Nukes LLC and Mr. Whiskey are not licensed medical entities, nor do they take responsibility for any advice or information put forth by guests. Take all advice at your own risk.

Transcript

So really excited. Thank you for coming today. Appreciate y'all. Appreciate you guys, of course. So Mr. Whiskey, I've known you just a few years, two or three years. But, met you at a podcast conference. Got fortunately enough to interview you a few months ago, and that's actually why I love podcasting, is I learned a ton of stuff I had no idea about you by just talking to you for 20 minutes on a podcast format to me. 'Cause feel like when I talk to people, it always feels like I'm a podcast interviewer of everyone I talk to. So thank you for being here so Mr. Whiskey- Mm ... same question kind of overall. Like, how did, how did you kind of find out about podcasting? Like, where did that come from? You were already out at the time, I think, so a veteran. What ... Kind of tell us how that kind of came about. So I started while still active duty. I was commuting a lot, traveling, driving for hours every weekend at the time. You can only listen to so much music and whatnot, and I said, "If only I could watch, you know, YouTube videos but without the video part," and that's how I got to podcasting, which is primarily audio only. Of course, there are video formats, of course. But I wanted to get it to, you know, not have my phone on the whole time in the car, especially driving at night, just have it turned off and away, but listening. And to make that time productive I said, you know, one of the beauties of podcasting is that you can multitask with it. You can get an education or entertain or distract your mind, whatever you're using podcasting for, while doing other things. And I think that's one of the beautiful things about it. You don't have to sit down and dedicate your time to it. You c- certainly can. But you can multitask, and so that's what I did. I always believe in capitalizing my time, being productive. And so listening to this and then seeing the nuclear operated community struggle with so many subjects that are really important and need to be talked about, I said, "Well, why not make a podcast about this?" And I didn't do any research beforehand. My biggest advice is do research first. I didn't look up how to start a podcast. I did the first platform I found and, you know, kind of just- winged it. And there were a lot of mistakes I made financially. Especially for anyone who's a veteran, there are, if you're gonna make podcasting a business, there are waivers if you're a veteran to not have to pay certain fees and stuff, stuff that I did pay for, hundreds of dollars in business fees and podcasting stuff that, was different for veterans. And figuring out... I didn't start with, you know, people say start with five to 10 episodes already ready and have a base built. I was doing one every few weeks kind of haphazardly, and I've, you know, grown a long way since then. But doing that research first, knowing that there are so many tools available that people have made to streamline this process now more than ever before, that's so important to look into so Mr. Whiskey, you k- you said you started on active duty. Were there other-- if you're even asking, but were there other people that you were hearing that were podcasting already, or was it-- 'Cause I know when she started, and he talked about years ago, I kinda started to get into it, dabble a little bit in 2014. Those-- All those years were early, so there wasn't a lot of military veterans doing podcasting. So I guess for number one, what year was it, and then what was that like? Your-- Were any of your friends or buddies or people that you were serving with doing podcasting? Not at all. In fact, you know, the whole premise of my show was supposed to be getting us as a group as the representatives of the nuclear community, and I often say it's just me. None of them believed in it because of all these misconceptions about what a podcast was, about what it is as a business, what it is as a hobby, why you do it, who listens to it. So at that time, I didn't know about any military podcasts. You know, I had just found out that one of the YouTubers I listen to, they had started a podcast as well, and then they started another podcast with their father, and I was listening to comedy podcasts because I found it very entertaining, and at the time I was still cycling through educational podcasts, 'cause I kept coming across ones that were just too monotone. And driving at night for up to eight hours at a time I was driving, did not want any monotone podcasts on. And so I really liked the comedy, kept the beat and the cadence of keeping the car ride alive. And so at that time, I didn't know if there was active duty people doing it or not, and to me it didn't really matter because I said, "I'm gonna do this, uh, regardless of that." Because it shouldn't affect it. One of the things we talk about here is being active duty, that's part of your lifestyle. It shouldn't be your whole lifestyle and consume everything. You still have the opportunities to make the most of your free time. We know it's difficult, that the military is emotionally, spiritually, and physically draining. One of the things I talk about a lot is vegetation. A lot of, you know, people just wanna go home and do video games, drink, or go to sleep. They don't wanna invest into making a podcast, which is a lot more work than people realize, or going out to events. Most people have never explored outside of their base because they're just too tired and drained, and I think we need to help that, and this conference is part of that, saying like, "Hey, we're military creators. We are also artists and comedians and podcasters, and everything we wanted to do before the military, while in the military, or that we're saving for afterward, we can do while we're there." So for me it was like I'm gonna start this podcast now. Why wait till I'm a veteran? So it's interesting that you say that. Like, y- uh, for you, and I wanna just ask you, 'cause I, I kinda think I know, but, like, you came up with, and you're Mr. Whiskey. So where... Was that part of your... 'Cause I wanna kinda talk a little bit about when someone, especially military or veterans, branding, this could be a very foreign concept, especially personal branding. So for you, seems very personal branding. Is Mr. Whiskey kinda part of that? Could you tell us a little bit about that? For sure. So for me, my podcast, while we touched upon, military adjacent subjects, talking about suicide prevention, addiction recovery, mental health, and our personal experiences, it wasn't supposed to be an entity of the military or representative or associated with it, and I think that's the huge distinction. There are people I see now in uniform doing active duty podcasts. When you do that, you have a certain role you play. I've had guests on my show who say, "Hey, I'm in the military. This podcast episode is me in my free time. This is my personal opinion, not a representation or expression of the military." And so for me, it wanted to be a personal thing. It wasn't about the military. Like, what the military was doing that affected our mental health or suicide, that was just because of our personal experience, but I've had a lot of guests who weren't that. And part of my journey was unboxing from the military niche because people said, "Oh, he's a veteran helping veterans." I said, "No, I'm a podcaster. I'm a person outside of that." And so I've had to do a lot of work at these conferences and through my show to talk about, like, it's not just about the military. That's one part of it. You know, it's- ... a part of our story. It's not the whole story, you know? And a lot of people unfortunately make that their whole identity. We talk a lot about veterans get out, especially the longer you've been in, who the uniform was their identity, and when they take it off, they're no one. They have nothing, and that's what I wanted to avoid. So Mr. Whiskey, you kinda talked about starting the podcast as what were your goals as you kind of figured out a little bit or navigated as you started? 'Cause when I think of leveraging, I think of- Having a goal, you kinda talked about, you know, being curious or reasons, you know. I know, when you interview people, it's always interest- you have interesting stories and things that come up. So what were some of the goals that you had to leverage for your podcast when you started? Right, I completely agree. I think that the basis for leveraging are your goals. So a lot of people will use their podcast as a lead magnet or a business funnel to promote their business and vice versa. Some people use it, I have a lot of authors who wanna promote their books. Some people use it for promotional reasons. I think that the reasons you do it are how you leverage it. So for me, going into now speaking, comedy, writing, and mostly wanting to speak at high schools and colleges to reach the, younger people, 'cause my podcast reaches a lot of people in their 30s and 40s. I really wanna reach those younger people to have mentorship to focus on prevention rather than intervention. A lot of the people I work with, it's intervention. It's, they're already addicted. They've already attempted suicide. I wanna reach the... Because children suicide rates are extremely high now. Their mental health crisis is terrible for all these generations, and when I say kids, it's from, you know, as young as eight, nine, 10 years old to now 25, right? And so for me Having a podcast, and most importantly, a consistency with that podcast, has built authority, reputation, and trust, right? So when I go to a school and I say, "I'd like to speak on this subject," they're gonna say, "What's your experience?" And on top of saying, "Hey, I stopped suicides and homicide-suicides while in the service in the military," which already is huge authority, I say, "You can look me up online. The first few pages of Google or any search engine, you can find me speaking at conferences on that subject. You have over 300 episodes of that subject. You have books I've been in, articles." So I think podcasting, the greatest thing is building your brand, which can be authority and trust and reputation. Now, if you're doing it for a personal reason, it still sets you up for future possibilities that you're not even thinking of right now. I think there's no really downside, unless you're saying something not in alignment with your company or your morality, there's no downside to having the podcast. I mean, you might say something embarrassing, but we do that every day anyway, right? I think- People do that on social all the time. Right, right. So I say you might as well do it. And I think most importantly, so many people chase numbers, right? A lot of new podcasters and a lot of experienced podcasters chase numbers. I always say that it'll reach the right person at the right time. I live by an expression, and I don't know who said this quote originally, a guest shared it with me, but I say, "We are planting the seeds of a tree whose shade we will never sit under," right? So this podcast episode, this panel right here, may reach someone well after we're all dead. Uh, maybe I'll still be alive, but, you know, I think that it just- Ouch. Wow. You do know I'm doing 45 minutes of stand-up tonight- Nicely done. Warm-up for- ... and I am going to roast the crap out of you. He's gonna do some crowd work. Warming up for comedy. He's like, "I'm gonna get it in now because I'm not the main comedian." Right. But I, I say all that to say, you know, I had a young lady from Malaysia write out and say, "This episode changed my life." And now I've got plenty of hate mail, more so than fan mail, and that's how life is. You're gonna have more enemies than people who like you, especially when you're doing work like we're doing. But just for that one person, uh, you know, even if it took 300 episodes to produce, that is so worth anyone's time. So, um- I'm trying to think of one last question for you, Mr. Whiskey, but, we're about to open it up for Q&A. Is everybody o- okay with that for a little bit? So we can kind of ad lib if there's no questions. But, you know, we talked about the different mistakes, definitely. I know I wanted to mention, like, it's a horrible feeling. One time I interviewed a group of people who had never been on a podcast and then or- like orchestrated it an hour and some minutes, you know, p- an, I, I press record, pr- it's like, "Hey, cool." Then you focus on all these people and to do a good job and great questions, get all the way to the end and look and it's like, "Oh, wow, like, it didn't record any of it." I was like, "Then how am I gonna tell these people?" So, you know, what were some... Do you have any kind of, I don't wanna say bad experiences, but based on that, did you have any kind of something where something didn't go right? So I'll answer all of the above, and I wanna go back to your point earlier about legacy. Uh, multiple people that I met that year with you at PodFest actually passed away before the next year, people that, you know, those pictures and those interviews are the last thing we have. And I think what's so interesting, I talk all the time about, is that, like, I don't have pictures of my great-grandparents or even really my grandparents, and I'm thinking about my grandkids are gonna see, like, embarrassing high school pictures of me. Like, they have so much access to us, and I'm very curious how that'll shape the connections we have, and part of that is, is podcasting. And so, you know, I always joke about, I think we've seen a lot of intergenerational podcasts bringing families together, bringing awareness. I used to host a podcast that the whole point was, like, all the generations, they're just labels. At the end of the day, we're all people. We live a little differently, but it's the same thing for gender, race, and everything, and we need to get along. I think podcasting is a great bridge for all of that, and legacy is a huge part of that. As far as bad experiences, I had a person show up to my show, didn't know the name of it, didn't know that I was a veteran, which is the first line of the show, right? So you're gonna have bad guest experiences. I've had guests that... And this is a tough choice you have to make as a podcaster. You're gonna wanna be nice to everyone, and you can't be. I've had huge blowouts with people who I said res- very respectfully, I said, "You're not in alignment with what my show is putting out." Because a lot of guests, not all guests, but people who just wanna promote stuff, they don't care what your show is, just put me on it. Mm-hmm. Shows that aren't in alignment with you or have the right audience are not productive for either of y'all's time, but people are gonna do that. So you have to learn to say no. You have to kind of harden your heart a bit. I've even had episodes I recorded and later on I said, "Listen, I can't put this out, you know, because I, I did some research and some of the claims you made were wrong or misleading or against our government," right? And so that can be the tough part. I think it's all about mindset. The biggest challenge is for a lot of people, they don't know why, again, why they're starting their podcast, and wh- they don't plan out and research, and then later on they're like, "Man, I thought..." And one of the big things is people think it's a money maker overnight, right? Because they see these big podcast contracts and this. Last statistic I saw was about, and these numbers could have shifted, but it was, like, about .001% make 75% of the earnings in a lot of these entertainment industry and creation bases. So a lot of people get this expectation. I've had guests who were on my show, podcasters, they quit because they said, "Mr. Whiskey, I didn't start making 40 grand a month." I said, "I don't know why you ever thought you were." You know, it's about preparing yourself for the harsh reality that you may have no one listen to your show, you may have one person and it's your mom, right? You have sometimes periods where, you know, there are no guests. Download days fluctuate, engagement days fluctuate. You're gonna be outperformed by brainless content on the internet. You're gonna be posting social media clips. I post social media clips about how to intervene in suicide, about human trafficking awareness and stuff. I get people telling me they're pro-human trafficking, they're pro-suicide, and my content's garbage. And meanwhile, I saw a guy, he was touching anthills and rating them, one million likes, right? So you have to be mentally prepared to really struggle with that kind of stuff. And you will encounter so much hatred along the way, but it's moments like this with the people who actually care. Because one thing I've noticed with podcasting, you don't get hate from people who have done it well or are high-ranking in that world, you get hate from people who are typically losers, who are typically online, they have the screen between them, right? People who have done well will say, "Hey, I saw your content. I just wanna give you some criticism. You know, you could change the lighting or the microphone." They do it respectfully 'cause they were there once too. And the people who haven't been there aren't sympathetic and, and they're just hateful to be hateful. And that's a challenge with all of social media, all of human society right now. In podcasting, putting yourself out there, you are extremely exposed to it even more. Yeah. One, one of the most heartbreaking things I get, you know, when I have a, a phone call from somebody that says, "Hey, I just lost my job. I wanna start a podcast to make money." Right. Like, man, you know, there's a lot more work to it than that. That's like becoming a comedian. Big bucks there. Yeah. There you go. Or thinking that the military pays well. There's not. Well, there is now, but there w- it's not when you start, no. No, I'm just kidding. No. No, it's, it's, it... You know, it takes... You gotta grind. You know, you're the- Yeah ... you're the station manager. Right. You're the program director. You're the talent. You're the engineer. You gotta... You know, you're doing all of it. You wear a lot of hats. Yes. More than you would expect. Wow, we are really warming up tonight. This is awesome. Question to you is what are some best, best practices, best tips that you can individually give me from your experience as successful podcasters to help me best create something more meaningful and more profitable down the road realistically as a video creator getting back into video and podcasting as, like, a synergy? So I actually attended your talk on UGC, so I have a couple things to say to you. And, and to your point, there's actually a gentleman I met at Podcast Movement who's launching an audio-only, like, version of TikTok for audio clips to create that space. And so what I would say is with audio clips, a lot of people use different tools to make social media clips from their podcasts and their long-form content. But you can do it with audio clips only by utilizing B-roll, so filming different stuff with just the audio clip over it. Could be you sitting on a bench at a park, and then it just has a quote from your show on it, as well as the audio for it, and that's a way to kind of farm those without having the classic, you know, all my clips from my show, it's just me and the guest split up. And I think with UGC as well, I do a little bit of it in the effect of the affiliate links that I have. So a lot of people make the mistake of just taking an affiliate link for a product or a business from someone who's been on their podcast, and then they just throw it in the description below. Now, I have all mine there. I have them on my website. But I also go out. So I had, basically an AA for smokers, and she asked me to promote it. And so I made videos talking about different stuff, promoting it, right? I've done different ads, basically. So you're not getting paid directly in some of the UGC contracts, but it's promoting that affiliate link, and you're promoting someone who was on your show, who's then gonna promote it to their audience, who is putting it on their website. I think that's one of the biggest things, is when you make social media clips, even if they're not the best, a lot of people aren't doing that for the people who have been on their show. One of the biggest mistakes, and one thing I take pride in, is that a lot of people don't promote the shows that they've been a guest on. They'll promote their show, promote their show. Every show I've been on, I make clips from that show as well and cross-promote it. It's so important to compound on that community. And so you can use different clips from all those shows, and what you should do is mess around with the formatting. You know, like I said, there's the vertical, where you have you and your guest stacked, or you could do different square shapes. You can really change it. I think one of the big things, though, is if you're looking to utilize audio clips, putting it over B-roll content to set it apart from what you're doing. And in that B-roll content with the audio clip, you could even have the product or their book in the background. Every time a guest on my show sends me a copy of their book, I take pictures with it. I take videos. I read excerpts from it. Sometimes I even do a solo review. I think that's the biggest thing, is not being each other's customers and clients, but collaborating. I got something I'd like to add, too, for anyone starting a podcast. A lot of people wanna start off audio only because they're camera shy or they, you know, sometimes it's a lot of extra work. It's more editing and more files and everything. What I say is record video, use only the audio. That way, if you ever wanna go back, and now you have every episode has a video, and you can backlog everything, or you can make clips from it even if you don't post the long form. So I say it is always more beneficial to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. So record video and audio at the same time, and if you use only audio, you still have the video in the future. For people who wanna start a podcast I want you to just kinda elaborate on this, 'cause for me, I would say for them to document the fact that they want to start the podcast and everything they're doing along the journey. And what I would love for each of you to do, if you could for me, is from your own perspective, what steps would you take or how would you tell them to document that entire journey so that they can actually earn as they learn, right? So to counteract that a little bit, James and I had this conversation on the Military Creator Con podcast. Outsourcing is fine. I would never do it personally, but if you're going to do it, don't do it right off the bat. Like, you could do it to set up some stuff, but what James and I know is, like, you learn so much from editing your own episodes, even if you only do it for the first five episodes. Really, they say on average, and again, this fluctuates for everyone, that about 20 episodes are required for you to really discover your voice and kind of, like, where you're going with your podcast, right? You gotta figure out what's the time that is ideal for you and for your listener. What do you wanna... How do you wanna talk? How do you wanna frame the conversation? It takes between 10 and 20 episodes to figure that out. Again, if you have more prep time ahead of time, which I mentioned earlier in the panel, like, there's a lot more that goes into it than you think. Like, you s- go to start a podcast, and then you're like, "Oh, wait, I need a, I need a logo. I need a description. I need to find a hosting platform. I need to do this." I think preparing ahead of time saves you a lot of heartache, but even with that, until you actually do it, right, until you actually live it, you're not gonna know how it feels. And I think after that point, you can outsource and have people do editing. And I'll say editing's come a long way, like they were mentioning. When I first started editing, you only had a audio file. You had to look for, like, is that a cough or is that someone yelling? Now they have a transcript alongside it. You just pick the words and edit. So it's, it's getting easier and easier. But I think it's so important to just- Pay attention to how you're talking, how the guests are talking, what the, you know, feedback is, and kinda shape that. It's gonna take a while to kind of build and firm up your identity in that. Militarycreatorcon.com. Ready to execute. Roger.